Over the past few months, we’ve been talking extensively to competing stock 3D sites FallingPixel.com and Exchange3D.com. The discussion has centered around challenges common to the whole industry—quality control and content certification, international languages and currencies, licensing rights and undercutting.
We quickly realized that we at TurboSquid are not the only ones who are concerned about these issues. And while we could try and address these problems on our own, it makes a lot more sense for us to band together to create solutions and advance the industry. We believe the stock 3D industry could be 25 times bigger than it is today, and we are investing everything we can to grow it. There’s no reason an artist should have to build a 3D model somebody has built before, but it still happens all the time.
For this reason, TurboSquid has joined forces with Falling Pixel and Exchange 3D, and we’re working together to address common industry issues. But we also value the diversity these sites bring to the industry, and we are eager to learn and benefit from each other’s strengths. For example, Falling Pixel sells in Euros as well as other currencies, while Exchange 3D caters to the Eastern European marketplace. All three sites will remain separately open for business as usual, offering the same range of options and choices to artists and customers.
SquidGuild Benefits
SquidGuild artists can now publish 3D models for sale on all three sites manually. In the future, SquidGuild members will be able to publish to all three sites automatically using SquidGuild Syndication. Our 3D model certification program, now in the beta phase at TurboSquid, will soon be in place across all three sites as well. We’ll also be unifying payments and reports across the three sites and offering access to alternative payment options like Webmoney and Moneybookers.
Royalty Rates
Royalty rates will be unified on May 1, 2011, across all three sites to match TurboSquid’s current royalty structure of 50-60% for exclusive artists and 40% for non-exclusive artists.
We thought we’d share TurboSquid’s current average royalty rates for ALL artists for 2009-2010. These rates are now over 55%, even when non-SquidGuild 40% payments are factored in, and these average rates continue to climb month after month.
What you can see from the graph below is that in the first month of the SquidGuild, we increased rates for new SquidGuild members to the 50-60% range without changing non-members to 40% (to give people time to decide on the program), which is reflected in the initial peak in August at 53.6%. We then changed the rates in September 2009 to 40% for non-SquidGuild members.
You can see that after the initial decision period, the rates climbed as artists signed up for the SquidGuild, with high adoption rates at all levels from Clear to Diamond. The current average royalty percentage across all artists at all levels (including non- SquidGuild) is over 55%. The result of these changes is that artist payouts are the highest they’ve ever been, both as total payments and as a percentage of sales at TurboSquid.
Jonathan Lloyd of Falling Pixel
As part of this new partnership, Jonathan Lloyd of Falling Pixel is working directly with TurboSquid on a big vision and strategy for the future. Jonathan comes with a wealth of experience in running a quality stock 3D site, and we look forward to incorporating his insights and knowledge.
If you have any questions about this announcement, please see our partnership FAQ or contact TurboSquid Member Services.